Everything Nate Oats said after Alabama's 94-79 win at North Carolina

No. 10 Alabama defeated No. 10 North Carolina, 94-79, on Wednesday night in Chapel Hill, North Carolina in the SEC/ACC Challenge. After the Crimson Tide advanced to 7-2 on the year, Alabama head coach Nate Oats spoke to reporters. Here is everything he said. 

Oats’ opening statement…

“I thought our guys showed a lot of toughness, resilience. We came off a tough loss against Oregon and easily could have let that loss turn into two, but I thought they got their minds right, ready to play. I thought they executed the defensive game plan – outside of transition buckets, which that’s what they do best, and we didn’t do a great job, particularly in the first half, with it. Outside of that, in the half-court, I mean, they struggled, and I thought our guys did a really good job executing the game plan. 

“I was super happy for these two guys. Houston was unselfish enough to come off as a redshirt and come in, and we were plus-12 in his nine minutes. He hit two threes, made some huge defensive plays, some rebounds, had a tip that kept an offensive rebound alive, and I think we got a dunk on that play. So he was great. 

“Jarin kind of settled in and made some big threes for us. I thought he did a great job on RJ Davis, who’s not easy to guard. I mean, RJ is one of the best guards in the country, and Jarin, for being a kid that’s supposed to be a freshman in college this year – he came in a year earlier and just 19 years old – I thought it did an unbelievable job on RJ, as well as Houston and Derrion Reed. 

“We tried to keep some size on Davis. He got his shots up, which we kind of knew I think he averaged 22 field goal attempts in the two previous games we played them. Got 24 up tonight, but we just wanted to make them as tough as we could. And he hit some tough ones. But I thought our guys, keeping some size on him, made them shoot very tough shots. I thought it was pretty good. 

“Coach Adams did a great job with the defensive game plan. For the most part, we took care of the ball, but late against the press and late in the first half, we weren’t good with it. But we did a better job taking care of the ball over the course of probably the other 34, 35 minutes.”

Oats on his assessment of Alabama’s defense…

“It was not good in transition, particularly in the first half. We had 24 transition possessions for them, and they scored 29 of their points and go 1.21, and then when had to go in a half-court, we had 39 points and 65 possessions for 0.6, which is, I mean, that’s like the best defense in the country type of stuff in the half court. The issue is we gave up so many in transition, which is what they do best. We just got to do a better job of getting back.

“I thought once we got our defense set, the shots that we were willing to give up is pretty much the shots that they took, and they were contested jumpers. I thought our bigs did a great job going vertical at the rim. You take away the transition, the second chance, our first-shot, half-court offense was elite tonight. So we got to get all of it figured out. The transition has got to get better. I thought the first shot was great, and then we got to be able to rebound the ball a little bit better.”

Oats on the significance he attaches to the SEC’s success against the ACC…

“It’s good for our league. I think we’ve got a really good basketball league. It was pretty good when I got here. Auburn was coming off a Final Four. Obviously, you had great tradition. Kentucky looks great. I know they took the loss last night, but they’ve done a great job so far this year. You got talent across the league. So I think to play a really good league like the ACC that’s got all kinds of great tradition and do it – what are we in the challenge right now? (12-1 at the time.) It’s great. So I think it’s obviously good because once you get in January, all you play is the SEC. So you need to establish yourself as an unbelievably great league in the non-conference because then when we’re playing all those teams, those games go a long ways.

“So even a tough loss on the road the SEC is not really going to hurt you a lot in the committee’s eyes if your league is doing this well in the non-conference. So great job by the league emphasizing basketball. Really good coaches in our league and some really good athletes. It’s tough. Tough night in, night out. This is a great environment, but some other great environments in the SEC we got to go into them when. So it’s good we’re able to go into an environment like this and get a win and get some confidence playing in a tough road environment.”

Oats on Latrell Wrightsell…

“I texted with him a little bit this afternoon. The surgery was successful. They repaired his Achilles. His parents are in town with him. Our guys talked about him in the locker room after the game. He’s great kid, a really good leader, and we’re going to surround him with a lot of support and care while he recovers and wish him a speedy recovery.”

Oats on what he attributes to the SEC’s rise…

“It is only my sixth year there, so the rise started before I got there, but it’s climbed since I’ve gotten in there, as well. I think what the stuff you did mention, I do think the financial resources are a big deal. I think the league decided they want to be good in basketball. It doesn’t need to just be a football or baseball league. There’s a lot of good sports, and with basketball being one of the more popular sports in college athletics, they decided to put a big point emphasis on it. They hired a guy that’s just in charge of men’s basketball, Dan Leibovitz, I think was the first one. He’s now at the Big East and Garth Glissman has been unbelievable since he got there. I think there’s an emphasis on it by the administration, by the league as a whole. I think putting the resources they need to, going out, hiring great coaches that are able to recruit great talent, we’ve got more NBA players, I believe, than any other league and typically have more NBA players in pretty much every draft. So got athletes with great coaches, and if you’re not on your A-game as a coach, you’re not going to win. So I think it’s just raised.

“I walked in the league and our big rival was Auburn, they were coming off a Final Four. I got hired, and then they made the Final Four a week after I got hired or so. So we had to try to match them. It took us five years. We finally got there. We got our Final Four. But you kind of go down the list. I mean, Tennessee and Rick Barnes is one of the best coaches in all of college basketball for a long time. Calipari’s done an unbelievable job at Kentucky. He’s got an unbelievable roster at Arkansas. Kentucky, Auburn, just keep going down the list. And some of them were very dominating wins last night. I thought Ole Miss had a really good win. It was good for our league. I’m glad we were able to help our league out because we didn’t help the league out last year with our SEC/ACC Challenge game.”

Oats on if he saw an improvement in Alabama’s offensive spacing…

“Way better. The turnovers came on some carelessness and then against the press, so the half-court spacing was significantly better. I thought we got guys better shots. You look, we were able to hit 12 threes, which we’d still like to get more off. But we were able to take care of the ball better, space the floor, get some threes. We also had some assists on some cuts because the spacing was better. I thought it was significantly better tonight than it had been.”

Oats on Labaron Philon’s success on the road…

“He’s a competitor. He’s been practicing hard. You have to deserve to play well, and he deserves to play well. He brings it every day in practice. He’s been bringing it since he walked on the court in June. He’s got the ultimate confidence. But you can’t just instill confidence in a kid. You have to earn that confidence. You learn about playing hard and practice, working on your game. I think he’s earned the confidence, he’s earned the playing time and he’s earned the right to play well. And he steps into these games not scared at all, and he brings it on both ends of the floor, and he’s played really well in big games for us.”

Oats on shots starting to fall for Aden Holloway…

“I thought it was great. Obviously, he’s a little upset with himself at the turnovers. His shooting was unbelievable. I don’t want to say this is what we expected, to go 5-of-9 every game, but we’ve seen him shoot it like this in practice for a long time. So we know what he’s capable of shooting the ball. The assist to turnovers, he’d been taking care of the ball. I think the press rattled him a little bit, and he’s a little upset with himself. So we’ll get that figured out. But the shooting was huge because Wrightsell’s been our best shooter all year, so we need somebody to step up and make some threes. So he hit five of our 12 threes, and I thought the minutes he gave us were great. We’ll give him a little bit better on defense and better at taking care of the ball moving forward.”

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